December 2012
Summary: Brunch with Chris G, Andy T, and Patrick at UVA Enoteca; organized spices; new edits to Patrick's newest version of a new book; upgraded from Airport Extreme (3rd-gen) to Time Capsule (4th-gen); Recharge Spa holiday dinner at Park Chalet; switched cellphone service from AT&T to Straight Talk; Neil G visits; Christmas dinner at Danny, Drew, Romy, and Phil's; Union Square shopping with Matt S; New Year's Eve with Ryan and Jason.
Dates on this page
Sat Dec 1, 2012
Breakfast at home: a very small bowl of oatmeal with diced apple and soy milk, cappuccino drink form a powdered mix that my mom gave me. House chores and organizing: laundry, removed labels from jars, began converting loose sheets of printed recipes to digital. Apple updates, including installing iTunes 11. Brunch at home with Patrick: hash brown and veggie patty on garlic asiago dinner roll with smoked cheddar. More house chores and organizing. Dinner at home with Patrick: delivery from Golden Gate Indian Cuisine: fish and vegetarian dishes. Watched two-thirds of Harold and Maude (1971) on Netflix DVD with Patrick. Investigated spice storage solutions. I was disappointed with all of the solutions sold as completed sets, typically with spices included. We have no counter or wall space to store spices, so spinning racks and wall racks were dismissed. We do have fridge wall space, though, and I liked the magnetic, windowed containers that stuck to metal, but (1) I could find only one size, which was larger than I wanted for my smallest size of container, (2) they didn't seem to be as airtight as a screw-on lid, (3) I'd constantly be worried about them accidentally falling, and (4) it's better to protect spices from light. Eventually I had found exactly what I wanted—SpiceCare by TableFare—but was then disappointed to learn that they had stopped making it in August 2012, and it was no longer available anywhere—direct, from vendors, or on eBay. I continued hunting. After much more research, I decided on and made a purchase of 2-ounce plastic bottles and 4-ounce plastic jars from SKS Bottle & Packaging (New York). I chose plastic containers because I've accidentally dropped a glass spice bottle in the past. That was tedious to resolve, and the cryworthy loss was a nearly full bottle of very good organic cinnamon. For these bottles and jars I chose a plastic that was clear, rather than opaque, because I wanted to be able to see the spices inside. This plastic is PET, so it's safe for food. Although I like sift-and-spoon hinged lids, snap lids were unacceptable to me for two reasons: (1) proper spice storage requires an airtight container and snap lids are not always airtight, and (2) a snap lid might pop open or come off if the container is dropped, so I chose a solution with screw-on lids. I chose aluminum instead of plastic lids because I've experienced that plastic lids sometimes crack or break over time or if accidentally screwed on too tightly or if dropped. I chose two sizes because we have a lot of spices in varying quantities. I chose square instead of round containers because these are going in a drawer and I don't want them rolling around causing labels to disappear from view. If I later decide I want more sizes, I have a lot of other size choices that will match my purchases from today. Some things I had wanted but are missing from the solution I chose: inner sifter lids (aka fitments), built-in levelers, nestability for empty containers. SpiceCare would have been perfect and I think would have met all my requirements except nestability. In any case, I'm glad to have finally gotten around to this task. It's been on my to do list for years. I'm going to have fun when the containers arrive.
Sun Dec 2, 2012
Late meal: leftover Indian food. Bought a new iMac. To bed very late. Woke around 8:00 AM to beeping. The power had gone out and the UPSes were crying. I shut down our computers and silenced the UPSes. Back to bed. Got out of bed after another hour or so. Breakfast: a sliced apple. Patrick got home from Chinatown. I showered. We drove to the Haight and browsed for a bit in Upper Playground. Then we met with Chris G and Andy T for a delicious brunch at UVA Enoteca. So nice to see them again. Bought gas. Home. Made a sewing tweak to new UNIQLO jeans after wearing them for the first time today. Wrapped a gift. Hand-amputagged new t-shirts from UNIQLO. Recharge Spa work for Drew: nail services consent form. Dinner at home with Patrick: leftover Indian food. Finished watching Harold and Maude (1971) on Netflix DVD with Patrick. Recharge Spa work for Drew: nail services consent form. Did research on buying cloth napkins that hide stains well. Late snack: Stove Top stuffing with mixed vegetables from frozen.
Mon Dec 3, 2012
Breakfast at home: tiny bowl of oatmeal, one sliced apple, 8 ounces of vegetable juice. Rode Muni to work. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Conf call with Susie and Eric: lab site comps review. Ethics training. Signed up with MeetUp following John K's post about the forthcoming SF Drupal Users Group meeting. Archived website data to external hard drive. Prepped then submitted a proposal to purchase a new iMac. Linkchecking. Lunch from Carmelina's: veggie taco, tortilla chips, water from my klean kanteen. Marshall messaging meeting. Chatted with Stephan and Joel about PharmAdMIT slowness. Archived website data to external hard drive. Troubleshot a problem with linklint: found a 42 MB logfile in pspgstage and incorrect permissions on some files and folders. Reran linklint on pspgstage and pharmacydev—all clear. Errand: bank. Calendar management: scheduling Jazzee pilot followup meeting. UC Ready work. Printed and sliced new phone number cheat sheets for OSACA and Education staff. Rode Muni home. Dinner at home with Patrick: grilled cod marinated in thyme, leftovers, gingerbread ale, hot water. Weight training: crunch.
Tue Dec 4, 2012
Breakfast at home: small bowl of oatmeal, one sliced apple, 8 ounces of vegetable juice. Rode Muni to work. Followup with Michael and Orlando about the forthcoming Jazzee meeting. UC Ready work. Followup with Lena S about top influencers in social media at UCSF. Completed UC Ready continuity planning for plancomm, informed Michael. UCSF shuttle from Parnassus to Laurel Heights. Comm team lunch meeting. Lunch from The View Cafe: half veggie sandwich on whole wheat, hot green tea. Comm team lunch meeting. Chatted with Eric and Greg about Marketo and Salesforce setup work. UCSF shuttle from Laurel Heights to Parnassus. Calendar management. Purchased 5 copies of Content Strategy for Mobile by Karen McGrane for the comm team. Met with Cindy about UC Ready continuity planning for OSACA. Management activites. UCSF shuttle from Parnassus to Mount Zion. Doctor appointment. Rode Muni from doctor's office to the Castro. Stopped at Pottery Barn to look at napkins and rugs. Rode Muni from Castro to home. Dinner at home with Patrick: leftovers, hot water. Dessert: Green and Black's hot chocolate with small marshmallows. Recharge Spa work for Drew: made live the nail services consent form, brought back diabetic pedicure pages. Did a little work: catching up on email. Weight training: crunch.
Wed Dec 5, 2012
House chores: ironing. Breakfast at home: small bowl of oatmeal, one sliced bosc pear, 8 ounces of vegetable juice. Rode Muni to work. PharmAdMIT troubleshooting and password database shortcut setup for Rick. Listserv management. 1-on-1 with Michael. Followup with Frances and UC Ready. C3 followup: Bodoni Italic. Purchased Bodoni Italic. Notified the staff about network problems reported by Stephan. Prep meeting for Joe G meeting. Posted an announcement about Student Inside Guide for Shirin for SAA. Kidney project news updates for Sara. Completed and submitted UC Ready for OSACA, informed Michael and Cindy. Followup tasks for Joe G meeting. Sincerely Sammie surprisingly stopped by to see the staff. Forwarded instructions on setting up Chatter to plancomm. Followup with Greg about Salesforce and Marketo. Emailed staff about including additional contacts in the home contact info list. Rode Muni to Aggie's place. She had just put Aiden to bed. We chatted a bit, catching up, and I helped with her computer woes. She ordered me shrimp pad thai, which I had with filtered water. After 2.5 hours we didn't fix everything, but her computer is in much better shape now. Rode Muni home.
Thu Dec 6, 2012
Weight training: weighted leg lift, crunch, hip ups. Breakfast at home: small bowl of oatmeal, one sliced pink lady apple, 8 ounces of tangerine juice. Rode Muni to work. Missed the bus by one minute. Weight training: king of the klutz. Got to work. C3 technical check-in. Submitted a DNS change request to ITS. Updated the OSACA home contact info list for Don. Fixed a minor problem that Lisa had found in the SOP org chart. Mary Anne video shoot with the staff. Snack: a tangerine. SOP IT staff vidconf. Snacks: garlic-and-sea-salt sunflower seeds, dried cherries. Late lunch from Panda Express: chow mein, mixed vegetables, veggie spring rolls. I said no to the fortune cookie. Spent about 2 hours with Stephan, Rick, and Joel troubleshooting a variety of problems: strange network slowness, strange slowness with PharmAdMIT, PharmAdMIT and Outlook hanging, Joel unable to see others' calendars, why Joel has Outlook 2007 instead of 2010, unable to successfully reset the password for the laptop account. I began documenting services in the SOP IT wiki, starting with the kiosk, since it was relatively simple, sent the draft to Michael for review. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Rode Muni home. Dinner at home with Patrick: cheese enchiladas, side of avocado with lime, side of black beans with grated cheese on top. We shared a gingerbread beer. Archived a recipe to PDF. Bought a 99-cent T-Mobile SIM card because Emery told me it would help a lot in setting up MMS on Straight Talk. 8 ounces of tangerine juice.
Fri Dec 7, 2012
I can't remember what I ate for breakfast today. Rode Muni to work. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Supp app incident followup meeting with Joel, Rick, and Stephan. Followup with Brad E about account setup. Followup with student AC and Rodney about duplex wireless printing. Supp app: followup with reported issues. Followup with changing some references on the web to Mary Anne. Finally got admin access to our dev site with C3 via Lolita. Followup with the issue I reported in which Movi is unable to share the full desktop, which might not be resolved until we switch to Cisco Jabber. Answered a listserv question for resident PE. 1-on-1 with Rodney. Supp app: problem investigation. Met with Susie, Eric, and Nancy about CLS data cleanup, sent them notes following the meeting. Resolved supp app and FillPDF error "ERROR -32700: Parse error. Request not well formed." by manually removing (retyping) data in a field that was likely entered on a computer with non-English language input. Followup with Millo to confirm that email addresses on their mail system is not case-sensitive. (It is not.) More followup with Rodney about duplex wireless printing. Followup with student SL about a wireless problem report. More supp app work: resolved a supp app and fillpdf error in which the default Drupal "access denied" page appeared when attempting to view a PDF by manually creating URLs to each node then opening each URL individually to identify which node had the access problem then, as admin, recording the data for that node then deleting it and recreating it. Asked Erik W why there was no iMac in the JACS listing. Rode Muni to Duboce Park. Walked to the Castro. One mushroom pizza slice at Escape From New York Pizza. Will joined me and had a pepperoni slice. Drinks with Will at Toad Hall. Met his friend John. After some time his friends from the gym Chad and Phi (pronounced "fee") joined us for more drinks. Later the four of us went to Badlands and danced. Met Victor. Tonight was unusually dead in the Castro. All the bars seemed to have lighter-than-normal crowds except the brand new Hi Tops (which replaced Lime) which was packed. After dancing we walked Will to his car. Everyone left, and I had a late meal by myself at Wasabi Bistro: california roll, dragon roll, water. Rode Muni home. Encountered Karl B on the train, chatted with him a bit before his stop. My favorite moment of the evening: I'm talking with Chad, and he says, "Wait. How old are you?" At Toad Hall I particularly enjoyed a music video called "Oh My God" by Mark Ronson featuring Lily Allen which featured animation mixed with live action.
Sat Dec 8, 2012
Realized this morning that on my computer at home that my copy of VMware Fusion 4 stopped working when I upgraded to OS 10.8 Lion a while back. I rarely use Fusion at home. Today it was because I was troubleshooting a problem with calendar reminders and suspected that Internet Explorer might reveal a way to a solution that could not be seen in non-IE browsers. I can't remember the last time I used Windows at home. Breakfast at home: leftover vegetable soup. Laundry. Uploaded mostly-old photos to Flickr and Facebook. Patrick made a persimmon cobbler. Lunch: mexican breakfast wraps: fried egg, black beans, and cheese wrapped in corn tortillas. Spent some time in Illustrator with the drawing I did of our apartment layout rearranging furniture and trying to see if our apartment will accommodate an expandable table so that we can have proper dinner parties instead of having guests crowd around our coffee table to eat. Dinner at home with Patrick: tofu wide noodles with five-spice tofu, mushrooms, and other seasonings. Watched Prometheus (2012) on Netflix DVD with Patrick. Late meal: pasta in tomato sauce from a can.
Sun Dec 9, 2012
Prepped a gift. Breakfast: 2-egg scramble with mushrooms, red onion, and parsley; 2 hash browns, hot water, 8 ounces of tangerine juice. House chores: vacuuming. Cut my hair, showered. Threw away the original floor mats in my car and replaced them with "new" floor mats that I had received as a gift in December 1998 from Jim M and had kept all this time not knowing when I'd need them. He bought them for me not realizing that my car came with floor mats. More vacuuming and organizing. Spent about an hour organizing apps on the iPad. When I first synced it with my iMac I think it copied all the apps that I had on my iPhone to the iPad but without the folders. Snack with Patrick: popcorn from a saucepan. More organizing. Dinner at home with Patrick: veggie burger. More iPad app organizing.
Mon Dec 10, 2012
Weight training: crunch. I created an account with Meetup on December 4 for a Drupal Users Group meeting on December 10. Since then I have received 11 messages related to this one event. This morning I adjusted my mailing preferences at meetup.com accordingly. Such an awful first experience with Meetup. I hope it gets better. Breakfast: 8 ounces of orange juice, 8 ounces of cappuccino drink, small bowl of oatmeal with sliced banana and cinnamon. Rode my bike to work. It was my first time back on the bike in a long time. Mailed a package. Spent most of the day in the SOP IT wiki documenting services. Today I worked mostly on HootSuite. Updated preview session dates and calendars for Shirin. Zach S showed me how to control stylesheets in libwiki, and I was pleased. Lunch at Yumma's: veggie wrap. I ate here once about 10 years ago and never returned because my food turned out spicier than I had expected. I hadn't known until today that there was a back patio here. It's entirely shaded with umbrellas, so much so that there's not a single sunny spot to sit. I didn't enjoy the wrap I ate because the chunkiness of the vegetables made the wrap fall apart easily and because it was spicy even though I asked for it to be not spicy. I don't think there was an error; I think the sauce is simply spicy and they don't feel that it's spicy so they say it's not spicy. 1-on-1 with Susie: UC Ready, strategic plan milestones, Marketo, SOP IT wiki. Chatted with John K about SimpleSAML, SSL, load balancers, LDAP, and Acquia. Sent a status report and reminders to C3 and our team. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Rode Muni home. The spice bottles I ordered recently have arrived, so I unpacked and washed them. Dinner at home: I cooked a shrimp and veggie stir-fry from a frozen prepared bag.
Tue Dec 11, 2012
Weight training: crunch, dumbbell curl, weighted squat. Breakfast at home: oatmeal with diced gala apple, cinnamon, unsweetened soy milk. Rode Muni to work. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Confirmed Sammie's email account alias was removed from Joel's. Followup on C3 issues with Acquia. Reported a wiki outage to Zach S. SOP IT wiki: documenting services. Calendar management. Lunch from Palio: christmas wrap with turkey. I didn't like it very much. Too earthy. Encountered Bill L at Palio from a distance. Ordered paper checks from my bank. Listserv management. Prepped strategic plan milestones, sent to Susie for review. Posted updated winter draft schedules for Lucia. Followup with Rebecca about IPQB and CBS requirements. Followup with Greg and Eric about QBC and grad programs hosting migration. Chatted with Frances' team about new hardware purchases. Followup with Charles K about a recent DNS request. 1-on-1 with Cindy. Sent Cindy links to the SOP IT wiki. Followup with Kurt G about emergency planning. Rode my bike home. Patrick was having an allergy attack and couldn't cook, and I was too cold and tired to cook, so we got delivery from King of Thai Noodle: creamy coconut chicken soup, thai fried rice, pad kee mao, sticky rice with mango. Today I learned you can etch glass using a cream that is applied to the glass and washed away after 5 minutes. I also learned that there exists a machine that enables you to create stickers from normal paper. It's made by a company called Xyron. Began editing the first hundred pages of a new book that Patrick wrote: pages 1 to 3. Weight training: crunch.
Wed Dec 12, 2012
Archived documents. Breakfast at home: oatmeal with diced bosc pear, cinnamon. Rode Muni to work. Continued troubleshooting network problems with Joel's computer. This time I shot video with the flipcam. Linkchecking, kiosk work. SOP IT wiki: documenting services. 1-on-1 with Michael. Video production in iMovie (failed), then Final Cut Pro (failed), then upload to Flickr (failed), then iMovie (success), then upload to YouTube (failed). Lunch by myself at Lime Tree: nasi goreng with shrimp, hot orange spice tea: about $11 after tip. Chatted with Eric about credentials for the school's YouTube account. SOP IT wiki: documenting services. Uploaded the network troubleshooting video to YouTube (success), followup with Stephan, Ariel, Joel, Rick, and Cindy. Paid some attention to The Archive. This time, I reexamined saved email messages referring to images that Susie and I liked but which we don't own, so I spent some time crafting messages to ask people if we could use them. One is an image on Flickr. Another is by Marco S at DMM. Rode Muni home. Dinner at home with Patrick: grilled shrimp with leftovers from yesterday, hot water. Dessert: a cup of peppermint hot chocolate, part of a candy cane. Watched about two-thirds of The Amazing Spider-Man on Netflix DVD with Patrick. Installed iPhone apps for Flickr and HootSuite. Purchased a 23andMe kit and created an account. Began spice organization: agar agar, black sesame seeds, dried mushrooms, bay leaves. Took the 23andMe sexual orientation survey. Various stretches. Weight training: crunch.
Thu Dec 13, 2012
Stretches. Weight training: tricep kickback, parallel dip. Breakfast at home: oatmeal with diced gala apple, cinnamon, soy milk. Hand-delivered by car a misdelivered letter that was addressed to the same house number but five blocks over. Upon returning, I found that I had lost my parking space and had to find another. Missed the bus by a few minutes, so I rode my bike to work. Sent Dan P an escalation following up on student YC having a problem with Outlook. C3 technical check-in meeting. Followup with Zach S about a problem with URL naming in Confluence. Turns out there's a bug in Confluence whereby URLs ending with a parenthesis (or any other reserved character) will cause the page's URL to use the page ID rather than the page title. Forgot my cash clip today, so I got money from the ATM. Lunch: I wanted a taco from Carmelina's, but the line was momentarily too long, so I got a panda bowl of chow mein and vegetables from Panda Express which had no line. Set up my new MacBook Air for work. I was interested to see that the cheesy Welcome-in-every-human-language video was gone from the setup process, so things went much faster and felt more professional. I was done much faster than I expected. Added a few items to the SOP IT wiki. Important meeting with interim dean Joe G, Susie, Michael W, Eric, Michael N. The meeting went very well. Web edits for Cindy and Lucia: graduation filing. Lisa thought she had a virus on her personal laptop and asked me to check it out. I did, and there's nothing wrong. I installed a bunch of updates, but the laptop seemed normal to me. Rode Muni home. Dinner at home with Patrick: brown-rice-noodle pad thai with shrimp and vegetables, hot water. Dessert: hot chocolate with mini marshmallows. Finished watching The Amazing Spider-Man on Netflix DVD with Patrick. Continued editing Patrick's new book: pages 4 to 22. Continued with spice organization: orange peel, red pepper, garlic powder.
Fri Dec 14, 2012
Breakfast at home: cinnamon-apple granola with diced bosc pear. Rode Muni to work. Notified Susie and Eric that the dsulab website was down. Calendar management. SOP IT wiki service documentation work: Incapsula. Shuttle to Laurel Heights. Lunch from The View Cafe: tuna salad sandwich. C3 training meeting with Brad E and Mark F, newly meeting Brad E in person. Shuttle from Laurel Heights to Parnassus. Supp app incident report for Cindy: reviewed Eric's notes, sent it to Joel for review. Followup with Dan P about student YC's request. Followup with Nancy about CLS data cleanup. Calendar management. CAPSLEAD app upload for Cindy. Followup with Rick W about Jazzee for dentistry. Calendar management. Followup with Lisa D about whether Jazzee applicants can save a copy of their applications for James. Archived documents. Made a screen rez adjustment to Rick's computer. Finalized a new hardware order and sent it to Frances and Cindy for review. Left work at 9:30 PM. Dinner at Park Chow by myself: petite wedge salad, bowl of minestrone soup, hot water. Rode Muni home. The bus driver was unnecessarily uncommunicative and unnecessarily rude to me, but I returned this with kindness and felt good about it. Stretches, crunch, reverse crunch.
Sat Dec 15, 2012
Breakfast: an apple. Continued with spice organization: masala, thyme, parsley, turmeric, paprika, ground coriander, cayenne, cardamom, sage #1, mace, whole coriander, rosemary, nutmeg, cumin leaves, clove, mint, sage #2, black peppercorn, rainbow peppercorn, white peppercorn, cinnamon sugar, allspice, lemon peel. Lunch at home with Patrick: leftover fried rice. Determined which cookbooks we own are available in digital versions. Nap. Recharge Spa holiday dinner at Park Chalet. Finished bottling procedures for spice organization. I can't remember which spices I worked with today. Continued editing Patrick's new book: pages 22 to 46.
Sun Dec 16, 2012
Breakfast: leftovers. Continued editing Patrick's new book: pages 46 to 52. Microsoft Word 2011 hangs frequently yesterday and today with beach ball of death. Ran Disk Utility. Verify disk = no problems. Ran repair permissions three times. I copied the file locally (instead of opening it from Patrick's computer), disabled a lot of fonts, searched for duplicates, found no dupes, cleared the font cache using atsutil databases -removeUser, installed the newest version of Cocktail, restarted the Mac. Set up the new Time Capsule to replace my 2009 Airport Extreme. I bought this primarily to simplify. After setting this up, I could theoretically get rid of three external hard drives I was using to back up my iMac, Patrick's iMac, and my MacBook Air. I thought the Time Capsule setup was going to be difficult but found that Apple has carefully thought out the user experience for this process. Unfortunately, while transferring settings from the Airport Extreme to the Time Capsule, the setup encountered an unexpected error and the user experience wasn't that great after all. It did successfully transfer the settings, but I had to figure some things out on my own that non-geeky people would likely not have been able to figure out so easily. I swapped the devices in place, then readded the old device to extend the network only so that I could then restore it to original settings so that I was certain that it did not contain any network passwords or settings. I began a Time Capsule backup from the MacBook Air, then removed its external Time Machine hard drive from service. After that I wrangled with HandyPrint, upgrading it to the latest version, then purchasing a license code, then testing it. It's working now. Began watching Barbarella (1968) on Netflix instant watch with Patrick. Nap. Dinner at home with Patrick: Milan-style lasagne adapted from Esalen Cookbook. Finished watching Barbarella. Considered migrating the Time Machine backup for my iMac from an external hard drive to Time Capsule using information provided by pondini (#18), but chose instead to just start anew.
Mon Dec 17, 2012
Stretches, weight training: crunch. Rode Muni to work. Staff appreciation holiday breakfast. I unhooked the UPS under my desk because it was too sensitive to power fluctuations and although I tried changing the settings to make it less sensitive it still would not cooperate, so I unhooked it completely and am now running without a UPS. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Followup with Michael N about monitor redeployment. Room scheduling. Calendar management. Hardware order approval request. CAPSLEAD application modification for Cindy. UCSF shuttle from Parnassus to Laurel Heights. For a special holiday lunch, Susie drove the team (minus David who called in sick) to Larkspur. Lunch at Tavern at Lark Creek. Hot rolls with butter. Mac and cheese croquettes with white cheddar fondue. I had a salmon sandwich with side salad. Paula had wagyu beef bolonese with egg pappardelle, garden herbs, and pecorino. Eric had braised boneless beef short ribs with creamy polenta, pearl onions, wild mushrooms, and carrots. Susie had day boat scallops with chanterelle mushrooms, brussels sprouts, cauliflower puree, huckleberries. For dessert I had butterscotch pudding with chantilly cream and a cookie. Paula had new-york-style cheesecake with graham cracker crust and blueberries. Eric had buttermilk chocolate cake with sour cream fudge frosting and cocoa nib ice cream. Susie had bites of each. UCSF shuttle from Laurel Heights to Parnassus. Stopped at the hospital gift shop. Followup with John K about LDAP connection. Updated SOP IT wiki to permit Frances to edit. Chatted with Lisa about a computer hardware order request then sent it to her. Notified servint customers about past and forthcoming server maintenance. Followup with Kevin L confirming that the Desai Lab website draft is ready. Responded to student RK about antivirus software and a listserv question. Sent the comm team a hardware order proposal for 416: Kensington SmartSockets. Updated the list of pilot websites with a status column as requested by Susie. Requested status of some pilot websites. Updated instructions for setting up a photocopying account for S9 for Lisa. Rode Muni home. Dinner at home with Patrick: leftovers. Dessert: hot chocolate with small marshmallows. I baked brownies from a box mix. Unloaded photos from my iPhone.
Tue Dec 18, 2012
Breakfast at home: oatmeal with diced gala apple, cinnamon, unsweetened soy milk. Rode Muni to work. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Met with Susie and Cindy. Surprise belated birthday party for Rodney. The Ray Marshall Paper Blossoms book I gave to the office was very popular. Followup with many about monitor redeployment. Followup with Pam E about her new website. Followup with many about Jazzee costs. Followup with Sara G about timeline for new websites. Lunch from Panda Express: panda bowl with chow mein and mixed vegetables, about $3.50. Sprint end meeting. I tried to join by conference call but realized just then that my speakerphone and hands-free features were no longer working on my phone. I had to endure the entire conference call with no hands-free. Followup with Lolita about problems seeing items in TeamWork. Followup with a Trustwave issue with the mass spec symposium site. Followup with Joel, Rick, and Stephan about network issues. Updated Danielle's phone number on the website for Shirin. Followup with Lolita about problems others seeing items in TeamWork. Updated Acquia domains from preview. to preview-. 1-on-1 with Eric: more git setup. Followup with supp app incident report. Checked in with John G about his new website. Followup with Susie about strategic plan milestones news headlines (dates are not consistent). More scanner hardware research for Frances. Submitted a ticket to ITS about the no-hands-free problem with my phone. Sent a reminder to staff about shutting down the fridge over winter break. Provided Frances and Cindy with a status report on hardware ordering. Followup with Incapsula about SOP IT wiki documentation. Followup with Susie and Cindy about this morning's meeting. Followup with Lolita about TeamWork. Edited some of Rodney's edits to the Kiosk page in the SOP IT wiki, sent him a note about it. Stayed late to wrap some gifts. Rode Muni home. Dinner at home with Patrick: grilled salmon, side salad, asiago roll. Dessert: 8 ounces of egg nog. Edited and uploaded photos to Flickr and Facebook.
Wed Dec 19, 2012
Breakfast at home: oat and bran granola with yogurt and diced gala apple. Weight training: crunch. Rode Muni to work. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Conference call with Nancy, Susie, and Eric. Calendar management. Followup with Cindy about questions about Wufoo. Lots of various followup in email. Recorded another video documenting the network problem that Joel is experiencing. Began processing the video in iMovie. Hardware research for Frances. Ordered a Kensington 62634 SmartSockets for LHTS 416. Conference call with Shawn and Brian from Incapsula about SOP IT wiki documentation. Set an annual calendar reminder for Incapsula assessment. Made live graduation filing details for Lucia and Cindy. Followup with Lisa about questions about my hardware order. Uploaded Joel's video to YouTube as unlisted, sent it to Stephan and Ariel, keeping Cindy, Joel, and Rick informed. Posted a new news item for Sara to the Kidney Project website. Posted updated schedules for Lucia. Eric and Greg completed prep work for migrating the QBC and grad programs websites from Acquia to Acquia. I learned today with help from ITS that my handsfree stopped working because of when I removed the UPS and didn't plug all the items back in. Chatted with Frances about printers and scanners. Thank you reception for Dean's Office staff at the RMB board room. It was my first time in RMB. The board room has a great view of Golden Gate Park, the Inner Sunset, and the tops of the towers of the Golden Gate Bridge. Joe G gave a little speech and asked everyone to introduce themselves. Paula and Peter sang "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." Snacks: seasoned cocktail shrimp, cow sliders, grilled vegetables, multicolored tortilla chips, cupcakes, Champagne, sparkling apple cider. I stayed until 5:44 PM to close the room. Rode Muni to the Castro. Dinner at Kitchen Story with Shawn P and Neil G. Neil is in town from Amsterdam for about a week. He surprised me with a small bag of Daelmans mini stroopwafels with bourbon vanilla—sweet! Just before leaving I encountered Rayson Y and nodded a hello. Afterwards we went to Hi Tops, my first time to this new gay sports bar in the Castro. Rode Muni home.
Thu Dec 20, 2012
Activated my Straight Talk SIM with my iPhone 3GS. I completed the process successfully. I thought the user experience of Straight Talk activation was awful primarily due to the deluge of instructions: on the activation kit sleeve, on the activation card (6 panels, 3 in English and 3 in Spanish), on the SIM on two sides, on the service card. There are too many instructions, and some are repeated and therefore redundant. Another problem is that much of the instructions is printed in extremely tiny text, some of it 5-point text! Some people will not be able to read this tiny text without assistance. Another problem is that upon completing the activation process I was given further instructions: "When your CURRENT PHONE stops working, follow the steps below in your NEW PHONE" and that I should expect my phone to stop working within the next 48 hours. So for the next 48 hours I think I need to carry around my activation kit so that I'm ready for when my phone stops working. After a few minutes I realized that the instructions don't make clear when you swap the SIM. The activation card says to insert the SIM after activation. But the end of the activation process says, "When your CURRENT PHONE stops working, follow the steps below in your NEW PHONE" and says nothing about when to insert the SIM. So confusing. I swapped SIMs. Upon inserting the new SIM I received a text message: "Your STRAIGHT TALK # is ##########. Welcome to STRAIGHT TALK." where ########## was my phone number. I did not know how to update the APN settings in my phone, and the Straight Talk instructions said merely, "For instructions on updating your phone, please refer to your phone's user manual or manufacturer for assistance." It would be better for these instructions to instead say, "Search Google. For example, search Google on 'how to update iphone apn.'" This led me to http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2283 which had incorrect instructions ("You can view the APN settings on your iOS device in the following location if it's permitted by your carrier: iPhone: Settings > General > Network > Cellular Data Network") because at Settings > General > Network there was a Cellular Data item but it was an on-off switch, not a place where I could insert settings. The 2nd Google search result led me to http://www.unlockit.co.nz/unlockit/?p=631. The instructions on this page said, "...and Choose United States, Straight Talk and install the Profile" but the only options I found were: Create APN, Submit APN, Promotions, and Help. I didn't know which one to choose, so I guessed Create APN. This let me choose United States and Straight Talk. I selected the Create APN button. It created an APN profile to install. I selected the Install button, followed by a warning and then Install Now. It asked me to enter my phone's password, so I did. The profile was successfully installed. Then I read about the T-Mobile SIM swap method to make MMS work and http://www.unlockit.co.nz/unlockit/?p=631 said that others have reported that it would not work with iPhone 3GS. With the Straight Talk SIM in place, I tested a phone call and a text message with image. Both worked, but the text message was probably not a true test since it said "iMessage" in the field in which I typed the message. From start to this point took about 2 hours. Breakfast at home: oatmeal with diced gala apple, cinnamon, unsweetened soy milk. I hate what Apple has done to TextEdit. It's super slow now when opening or saving documents, and it presumes incorrectly that I want to save things in Apple's cloud. There appears to be no way to specify that I want my computer to be the default location for opening or saving documents. Rode Muni to work. Sent scanner selection to Stephan for review. SOP IT wiki: Created "How to handle printer, scanner, fax problems." Sent scanner selection to Frances and Cindy for review. Scala's Bistro. Linkchecking, kiosk work. Holiday lunch at Scala's Bistro with the OSACA: Cindy, Joel, Lucia, Danielle, Shirin, Rick, Lisa. (Rodney and Don couldn't make it.) Bread, butter, and olive oil for the table. Shared appetizers: fritto misto (calamari, rock shrimp, padrón peppers, fennel, green beans, sherry-cayenne aïoli) and beef carpaccio (angus beef, capers, lemon, wild arugula, olive oil, parmigiano). Cindy had a caesar salad and side of brussels sprouts, Joel had a chickories salad (pink lady apples, arugula, walnuts, point reyes blue, yogurt dressing) and a coppa salami pizza (green onion, braised peppers, garlic confit, fontina), Lucia had orecchiette and italian sausage (spicy calabrian sausage, broccoli de ciccio, olio verde, pangrattato), Danielle had pansotti (with squash, brown butter, sage, and crispy guanciale), Shirin had linguine and clams (manila clams, garlic, roasted tomato, white wine, calabrian chilies), Rick had steak frites (green peppercorn sauce, pommes frites), Lisa had orecchiette and italian sausage, I had ricotta herb gnocchi (white shrimp, kohlrabi, olives, lobster buerre monte, basil, cambrian chili oil but without the cambrian chili oil). For dessert, the table split an order of coffee toffee gelato. Documented the procedure for resolving a problem with a printer, scanner, fax, or all-in-one device in the SOP IT wiki. Followup with Stephan about a question about how cuda works. I set my tag value to zero but none of my messages arriving in my inbox are tagged, so I think cuda is broken or I'm misunderstanding how it works. Followup with Shawn H about the Service Now UI problem I reported. Check-in with John G about website content development. Followup with Frances, Stephan, and Cindy about a scanner order for Frances' team. Thanked Marquita B from CPFM for the patch-and-paint she did in the student lounge following the removal of the computer. Announced completion of the student lounge computer. Asked Rodney to move the IRC reservations form to Qualtrics. Chatted with Susie about people content type. Followup with Nancy W about front door cardkey access to Laurel Heights. Followup with Ariel and Stephan about network issues for Joel and Rick. Tina B stopped by and gave me a small bag of assorted, seasoned nuts. Rode Muni home. Dinner at home with Patrick: butternut squash with brown rice syrup and spices, side salad, hot water. Continued editing Patrick's new book: pages 52 to 63.
Fri Dec 21, 2012
Breakfast: two kinds of granolas, sliced banana, unsweetened soy milk, 12 ounces of vegetable juice. Rode Muni to work. Linkchecking, kiosk work. SOP IT wiki: submit a surplus pickup request. Calendar management. Office holiday breakfast and gift exchange. Cindy received an FAO Schwartz barking plush puppy from Don. Shirin received a tiger hat-sleeve-mittens from Rodney. Don received a giant cupcake maker from Rick. Rodney received a white elephant in a pink crushed velvet bag from Joel. Lucia received Girl Scout note cards, a Boo calendar, and Polaroid note cards from me. Joel received a New Yorker Magazine desktop daily calendar from Cindy. Rick received artwork depicting candles and it had lights where the flames were from Lucia. Danielle received copies of recent Us Magazine and OK Magazine and dry skin hand creme from L'Occitane from herself. I received a box of ad hoc red velvet layer cake mix and a small red-handled spatula from Shirin. Lisa did not participate. Small web update for Cindy: diplomas. Ordering in BearBuy. Followup with Stephan, Ariel, and Dan about Joel and Rick's network issue. Defrosted and shut down the fridge. Snack from Panda Express: veggie spring rolls with sauce. Left work around 3:45. Rode Muni home. Snack: leftover lasagne. Our landlord Ed replaced our sink because the previous one had a crack in it. The new one is the same model as the old one. Very nice to have a replacement. Nap. Rode Muni to the Castro. Encountered Ping T on Castro Street, chatted with him briefly. The San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus is performing on Christmas Eve. Met Neil G and Shawn P at Toad Hall for drinks. Encountered Nathan M, met his friend Rachel. quantum13 joined. After a few rounds of drinks we got dinner. Dinner at K Pop with quantum13, Nathan, Neil, Jim, Shawn P. My first time at K Pop. I had two appetizers: three fried veggie potstickers, veggie jap chae, water. Food was delicious. The giant television showing korean pop videos was unfortunate mostly because it made you occasionally forget that other people were at your table, especially since my seat faced the screen directly. Am I watching music videos or am I dining with friends? The videos felt amateur in production quality which contrasted with the high-definition quality of the images. After a few videos, they kinda all seemed the same. Afterwards we went to Badlands where I encountered Mike B, met his friends Patrick and Paul. quantum13 and I left around 9:45 PM to attend Timmy D's Mayan Apocalypse party which was held at The Treehouse and in (I believe) his upstairs neighbor's apartment. Encountered many from the Syndicate that I hadn't seen in a while.
Sat Dec 22, 2012
Breakfast at home: small bowl of oatmeal with cinnamon and sliced banana, 12 ounces of vegetable juice. Was too tired to much of anything today aside from two things: (a) some housecleaning, (b) contacted Straight Talk support by email about how to get MMS on my iPhone 3GS. They responded quickly by email and then again by telephone. Basically they told me that I need to jailbreak my phone in order to get MMS to work. I'm not sure I'm ready to jailbreak. Their support sounded to me like it was outsourced to India. Support in writing and by voice was very stiff. I think the entire customer support industry needs to be reinvented to provide personalities that are more appropriate than what corporations think I want. Napped in the afternoon. Dinner at home with Patrick: leftovers for me, potstickers from frozen for Patrick, hot water. Today Patrick baked banana bread for Simmone and reorganized and cleaned in his room. We newly set up for him an Oregon Scientific projection clock that he had stopped using a while back. Late snack: two potstickers with dumpling sauce. Began reading The Where, The Why, and The How by Volvovski, Rothman, and Lamothe.
Sun Dec 23, 2012
Patrick discovered a leak in his room this morning. We sent our landlord an email and he's going to look at it tomorrow. I sent Amazon this feedback today: "Since Nov 27, 2012, I have placed 6 orders for scheduled gift cards and I have encountered a number of problems that I'm not sure you're aware of. (1) My recipient received his gift but told me that it didn't say who it was from even though when I ordered the gift card I completed a field to say who it was from. The To and From fields incorrectly say "[empty]" (2) The scheduled gift cards appear to send earlier than expected. e.g., I ordered 5 to be delivered on 12/25/2012 but when I log in today at 12/23/2012 my account says they have already been sent. (3) on the page at https://www.amazon.com /gp /css /gc /manage when I review the gift cards I have ordered or sent, you fail to show me the item I previously suggested. I want to see the item I suggested along with the gift card. Please contact me to acknowledge these problem reports and to let me know if or when these problems will be resolved. I like the feature very much—no one else yet has this feature as far as I know, so I'd like to continue using it, but you need to resolve these problems or the deal is off. Thanks!" Recently I created an account on pinterest solely to create a secret board to replace the three-ring binder of places that offer food delivery that Patrick and I use infrequently. It works alright for that. I have created no public boards yet. Breakfast: one slice of banana bread. Lunch: three leftover potstickers. Nap. Met Neil G at Edge for drinks. Met neil edge matt dustin thomas matt matt matt derek and mark. Later we went to dinner at Eureka Restaurant and Lounge. Prosecco for both. I ordered a half order of wild mushroom ravioli with truffled mascarpone. Neil ordered a half order of creole gumbo with house-smoked chicken and cajun sausage and a side of okra. Afterwards we bought white elephant gifts at Walgreens then took a cab to a house party on 32nd Avenue near Presidio thrown by a friend of Shawn P's named Aaron N. When we entered, the group was watching the end of Love, Actually, which I had never before seen. Following that, we exchanged white elephant gifts. I received an amplifier for an iPhone 4/4s. I gave a girl's backpack filled with things like a tiara and a mirror. Neil gave laundry detergent and received something but I can't remember what it was now. I met ahmed ivan shawn gabe taro mike lac. Some left the party to return to the Castro, so I hitched a ride and met them along the way: Taro, Mike, Lac. Taro wanted to go home, so Mike offered to drive him there (near the Mission, I think?). After that, Mike and Lac and I went to Badlands. Once inside Badlands I realized that the white elephant gift I received was no longer in my pocket. It must have fallen out while I was in the car, but I wasn't that attached to it anyhow. At Badlands I encountered Dean (who works at Moffitt Cafe), Paul M, and Doug. Rode Muni home. Tried getting food at King of Thai Noodle but they closed earlier than their posted hours—grrr. Erased an external hard drive in preparation for giving away or selling.
Mon Dec 24, 2012
Breakfast at home: two small slices of banana bread. Collected external hard drives and prepped them for selling or giving away. Patrick and I drove to Stonestown Mall. I had lunch at Jalapeno's (veggie taco salad in a bowl) while Patrick did some last-minute shopping. We went to Trader Joe's to get a few groceries. Home. The landlord stopped by to examine a leak in Patrick's room that we discovered yesterday morning. Backfilled some journal entries. Nap. Ordered chinese food delivery from Taipei Restauarant and Dim Sum via GrubHub. It was my first time using GrubHub, and I ordered from my iMac. The ordering process was serviceable, but not a very memorable experience. Seamless has still not responded to my question about why the review I wrote for South Sea Seafood Restaurant on April 7 was trimmed to 2,049 characters without warning. We wanted food from Xiao Loong but neither of us wanted to order by voice, and they did not have online ordering. Dinner: egg rolls, foil-wrapped chicken, wor won ton soup, sauteed cabbage with garlic cloves, mu shu pork, steamed rice. We have eaten in person at Taipei many times in the past, but I don't think we've ever had the egg rolls before. We received 2 free egg rolls with our order, and they are seasoned with Chinese five-spice, which to me makes these somewhat distinctive. Also notably unusual is that the wor wonton soup included some kind of tasty root vegetable we were unable to identify. As wor wonton soup does not normally include this, it's another note of distinction to the menu. In my foil-wrapped chicken I tasted a small piece of gristle, and I thought there was slightly too much rice wine. We were happy with everything else in our order except for the fortune cookies which were individually sealed but nonetheless tasted stale. Patrick's fortune: Your heart is pure. Your face has duck sauce on it. My fortune: Everything is coming your way. Perhaps you're in the wrong lane. The fortune cookie fortunes are fun and funny, but this is somewhat marred by the advertisement from eat24.com on the back, a bit of irony since we ordered via GrubHub. Watched Total Recall (2012) on Netflix DVD with Patrick. This film's best feature is its collection of futuristic, computer-generated sets, but even that, like much of the rest of the film, borrows too much from film history rather than inventing something largely new. This film has many, many obvious influences, sometimes matching scenes or plot elements exactly from films such as RoboCop, Blade Runner, The Matrix, Star Wars Episode I, The Fifth Element, Minority Report, the Jason Bourne series, The Da Vinci Code, James Bond films. The most original concept in it is the fall, and you're left to guess how and why it came to be. The film might not be very original in execution, but it is pleasing to the eye, exciting, and with more than a few unexpected turns. Patrick and I both thought it deserved higher ratings than we had found on imdb and Rotten Tomatoes. Organized bookmarks at my.xmarks.com until late. Late snack: leftover wor wonton soup. Erased another external hard drive in preparation for giving away or selling.
Tue Dec 25, 2012
Weight training: weighted crunch, front raise, lateral raise. Breakfast: leftovers from last night. Patrick spent the morning with Sam. Organized stuff. Downloaded free songs from OK Go. Lunch: I made steamed rice and ate that with leftovers. Nap. Patrick and I drove to his mom's where they exchanged gifts before we headed to dinner at PDDR's. Danny, Drew, Romy, Phil, Quyen, Dave, Anita, Pat, Jane, and Patrick. We ate a variety of appetizers: toasted cheesy somethings, seasoned nuts, chocolate-and-white-chocolate-chip cookies, brie, pate, crackers. Course 1 was crab soup. Course 2 was quinoa, com dap (crispy rice), salmon with mushrooms, green beans. For dessert we had rum cake, pumpkin cheesecake, chocolates, cookies, biscotti. Erased two more external hard drives in preparation for giving away or selling.
Wed Dec 26, 2012
Slept in. Patrick visited Aaron today. Lunch: leftover steamed rice and cabbage with garlic. Resolved errors in Patrick's Long Life Good Health website starting with "strict warning: Non-static method view::load() should not be called statically in [...] /sites /all /modules /views /views.module on line 1113." I traced this to issue 893128 (Fix E_STRICT notices) but could not find a patch that would work, so I successfully used DarrellDuane's solution of September 26, 2012 (Disabling warnings from php strict in Drupal) which involves hacking core. Resovled a problem in which the rollover was not appearing by editing the Javascript code for Long Life Good Health to more correctly specify the source object. Dinner at home with Patrick: quinoa macaroni with white cheddar cheese sauce from a packet, coconut shrimp from frozen, dipping sauces: light ranch, ketchup, hot water. Created an Evernote account. Checked out other Evernote products. Installed Evernote Clearly for Chrome. Made a minor change to the header of the spa website: made make/cancel an appointment fit on one line. Archived product description web pages, specs, and gallery images for recent Apple purchases: iMac, iPad, Time Capsule, Magic Mouse, Magic Trackpad, Wireless Keyboard.
Thu Dec 27, 2012
Spent all day and all night working on the Recharge Spa website redesign that I've had in progress for over a year, not finding enough spare time frequently enough to get serious work done. Today I worked on styling, responsive layouts, fine-tuning the info architecture, getting the contact us form to work in HTML5, fixed some hours code that wasn't working exactly right. Dinner with Patrick: delivery from Clay Oven via GrubHub. Late meal: leftovers. Tried lots of different instructions for getting Postfix to send mail from my computer so that I could test email scripts in PHP but failed and gave up. To bed very late.
Fri Dec 28, 2012
Slept in. Archived a copy of BK's November 3 post on Facebook called "Emergency 'Go Bag.'" Spent all day working on the Recharge Spa website redesign. Lunch: leftovers. Errands by car: gasoline, prescriptions. Dinner at home: leftovers. Read Castro Biscuit for the first and last time. (The writing and editing were unbearable.) Late snacks: freeze-dried peaches and cherries, popcorn from a saucepan with salt and taco seasoning.
Sat Dec 29, 2012
Breakfast at home: 2-egg omelette with grated cheese and green onions, garlic hash browns. More work on the Recharge Spa website redesign. Errand: took the car to the garage to ask about water filling in a compartment in the trunk. No obvious way for water to enter. I had emptied the water a few weeks ago but now the water is back. They said to come back next week. Snack: leftover sushi that Patrick brought home. Began cleaning out a bookcase of old books, old music, and other things that are no longer wanted or needed. Dinner: salad with no-oil carrot-ginger dressing, hot water. Watched Brave on Netflix DVD with Patrick. I thought the story and character development were weak but the animation was spectacular. More work on the Recharge Spa website redesign.
Sun Dec 30, 2012
Cleaned the bathroom. Breakfast at home: oat-and-honey granola with unsweetened soy milk and Tina's dried blueberries, 8 ounces of vegetable juice. Rode Muni to the Castro. Brunch with Matt S at Starbelly. He wore a blue-and-white t-shirt, a Catholic high school sweatshirt, Baldwin blue jeans, a black winter coat, and pale maroon canvas shoes. I wore a black short-sleeved t-shirt from 2xist, a brown long-sleeved waffle knit shirt from The Gap, a brown-black-and-alabaster winter sweater from Zara Boys, brown pants with red-black-and-beige-plaid cuffs also from Zara Boys, field/bracken Keen Briggs shoes, Ray Ban RB 3044 Aviator sunglasses. While waking to Muni we encountered Ray F on his way to brunch with others and briefly said hello. We rode F-Line to Powell Street and shopped in Union Square: UNIQLO (still noisy in checkout), Industrie Denim (friendly staff). We stopped for bubble tea (Matt) and green tea (me) at Floating Boat Sushi Restaurant (700 Grant Avenue). More shopping in Union Square then we took the J to the Mission: Urban Outfitters, Sephora, Afterlife. We walked past a store called Planks which Matt told me was owned by Dave Eggers, and we stepped inside to browse pirate gear for sale. The shop was beautifully designed, but I didn't understand who needs a shop for pirate gear. Later after looking it up I learned it's really just a front for writing tutoring for kids. We rested for a few minutes watching a fish tank theatre. We walked to the Castro and dined at The Dancing Pig, then had a drink at Hi Tops. We rode Muni back to my place, and he stopped in for a few minutes before I gave him a ride to meet his friend Holly elsewhere in the Sunset. I was thankful that he accepted an external hard drive that I no longer needed. Around 10:25 PM, I encountered noise problems with upstairs neighbors.
Mon Dec 31, 2012
Patrick and I notified our landlord of ongoing noise problems with upstairs neighbors. Laundry. More work on the Recharge Spa website redesign: removed old, unneeded code; dropped in PhotoSwipe and got it working; sent Drew a question about keeping current images or should we use newer ones. Reorganized our tie collection. Wrapped a package. More laundry. Lunch: leftover cabbage and tofu soup. More laundry. Snack: adzuki bean burger with grilled onion, tater tots. Nap. Patrick and Aaron celebrated New Year's Eve at our place. I attended Ryan and Jason's house party in the Mission. Jason made me a drink, but now I can't remember which one it was. Met Anthony Yu on his way out. Chatted with sneeper about red. Encountered many from The Syndicate. Met or encountered Newton L, Peter C, Masado (Toronto friend of Will Kho's), Anthony A (works for a business intelligence company) and Bryan Y (I think he said Jawbone), Brad (co-worker of Anthony A), David (friend of Anthony A and Bryan Y). At the party someone was using Cycloramic to take auto-spinning panoramic photos with an iPhone. I had never seen that before, and I thought it was gimmicky but interesting. Peter and I talked about choruses and men's choruses and ggmc.com. Mark and I talked about Germany, Europe, Spain, France, Bilbao, Guggenheim. I can't remember who told me, but I learned that there is a 2-part Treasure Island television series starring Eddie Izzard which I must find to watch. We welcomed the new year in the room with the television watching various cities around the world do the same. Ray gave pachooey, fickledragon, sneeper, and me a ride home. Aaron spent the night at our place on the couch.